PRODUCTS | FLAGSHIP STORE | NEWS & MEDIA | CONTACT
An easy way to keep up to date is to follow us on social media.
Although
very little used by florists, because it is only maintained for a short period,
we still want to explain you this special flower.
It embodies happiness, life, purity, renewal and joy. Emblematic of the month of
May and easy to grow, lily of the valley is also associated with Labor Day.
Lily of the valley comes from Japan and was introduced to France in the Middle
Ages.
The tradition dates back to the Renaissance when Charles IX got into the habit
of offering a sprig to each of the ladies making up his court. This tradition
then spread throughout the Kingdom.
Labor Day arrives much later, since it was in 1793 that it first appeared in the
Republican calendar. We then associate this celebration with lily of the valley
as an emblem.
Do you love the spring scent of lily of the valley? Several fragrances have
highlighted it: Diorissimo by Dior, Anaïs Anaïs by Anaïs, Summer Perfume by
Kenzo, Pleasures by Estée Lauder.
Kate Middleton hade a beautiful bouquet in her hands during her marriage. And so
did several other Royal Families.
In Asia, the flower got famous with the wedding of the Korean superstar Song Hye
Kyo Song Joong Ki. Song Hye Kyo’s wedding bouquet is a bouquet of lily of the
valley, pure and delicate, just like Song Hye Kyo’s masterful beauty, but this
marriage no longer exists. The lily of the valley is still a symbol of purity in
Asian’s hearts.
Name: Convallaria majalis
Family: Asparagaceae
Type: Herbaceous perennial
Height: 15 to 25 cm
Exposure: Partial shade, shade
Soil: Rich, well-drained and humus-rich
Flowering: April-May - Harvest: May
The wedding of lily of the valley symbolizes 13 years of marriage.
Since 1982, lily of the valley has been the national flower of Finland.
The whole plant is very poisonous, even fatal. To prevent lucky lily of the
valley from becoming bad luck, plant it where animals, especially cats, and
children cannot reach it without supervision.
Note, however, that in medicine and herbal medicine, thrush is useful for heart
problems and diuretics among others.
IPM Hortiflor Expo China is the flagship flower exhibition for Asia, organised by the China Flower Association for the 23rd time in 2021 in Shanghai. Every year the venue switches between Beijing and Shanghai. Below we will explain facts about this event and share experiences about our participations, mixed with some insights and trends on the Chinese floral market. We will limit ourselves to the floriculture and accessories, which covers about 30% of the event besides garden industry, logistics, landscaping and machinery. (remark: we use the statistics of 2019, as there are no more recent ones available, yet we consider these as representative even if this year is exceptional due to COVID, with mainly less International participation possible)
With 50.000 SQM of expo space hosting 900 exhibitors from 30 countries (limited presence due to COVID ofcourse) there’s a lot to see. Several countries have a national pavilion combining several suppliers. On a grand central stage there is also a florist show with famous international florists, forums on important topics. In conference rooms there are industrial seminars on new technologies, etc…
figure 1 : exhibitors per industry segment
2019
In general it’s our belief that expo’s are the most efficient way to expand your network, develop new potential client and display your products and capacities. The exhibitions is at moment crowded, mostly with professional visitors but also some leisure visitors or hobbyist, all are very interesting to get feeling of the market requirements and trends. China is really a different world than the EU or USA and is every year becoming more of its own identity, with its own fashion and taste; understanding this is one important key to success.
figure2: type of visitors at IPM Shanghai
hortiflor expo 19
We dare to state that IPM is a fair where visitors do purchase, or at least lay foundations for order placement. Every year we’ve been positively surprised with on-site orders and follow up orders. Most importantly, we find enough new contacts to keep our sales team busy for the next 6 months developing relations.
Dried & preserved flowers
In Europe dried flowers have become super trendy the past 4 years and the Asian markets quickly followed. The demand is enormous and supply (surely from Europe) limited and/or hard to get. This is leading to Chinese companies developing themselves to fill in those opportunities in the market. From our 10+ years China experience we know for sure that this will, over the next years, lead to the creation of several important players on the international market, competing with the known suppliers from Europe. Already now, via our trading branch KNGflora, we’re helping suppliers develop international clients. Preserved flowers have been hot in the Chinese market, for a large part thanks to trendsetters like The Beast, which thanks to their million followers on social media have made the public warm to buy “yong sheng hua”, literally meaning “ever alive flowers”. While these almost exclusively were imported at first, we now see Chinese suppliers reaching nearly as good quality for some breeds of flowers.
Social media, especially Pinterest
Chinese florist get most of their inspiration from the internet. The mobile phone is always within reach for chatting, learning, selling, paying, everything really. Chinese social media has segments for all types of users, yet we see that florist lean towards Pinterest for finding inspiration. Even though it’s officially blocked in China, surfers know their way around the great firewall. You will also see that many Chinese florist have started using Pinterest for their marketing, they use hanzi, Mandarin characters/language (how weird is that for a censored app?) Our brands are also present on the various social media. That is in first place WeChat, with official accounts; then several e-commerce apps like Little Red Book (XiaoHongShu) and of course TaoBao, TikTok of course, and then some industry specific platforms like HuaShengXian where florist promote their services and products in live-broadcasting sales.
Popular breeds
Without any doubt, the most trendy flower this year is the protea, therefor featuring on the front page of our OVIflora flyer:
Also banksia is in high demand, and ….
But also voluminous pampas are sold at high prices.
Colours of flowers on Chinese flower market
The popular colours are not very distinctive recently. There’s, because of the trend in dry flowers a lot of pastel tones and white and yellow, and if a colour accent is added we see they like some special colour like deep blue or purple. Pure red seems, except for the roses, not so inn.
Read about our latest events and market insights, click: NEWS
See lots of pictures on Pinterest and Instagram
Follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn
scan to see our WeChat articles
phone Belgium: +32 (0)475.330.974
phone China +86 180.256.13.48
email: ovi@oviflora.com
WeChat:
address: Shenzhen, China, YiZhan Mall
深圳市罗湖区艺展中心三期205
Website in the making... come back soon !
网站正在酝酿中...很快回来！
我们是一家总部设在中国的新公司
旨在响应市场对进口和分销的需求
主要是腌制和干花
来自荷兰和其他欧洲国家
而且还有非洲的Asouth和南美
进入中国市场。
荷兰和南非花卉进口OVI植物区系分布中国欧洲